Oil and Water

I am writing from a particularly disturbing sentence I read in Elizabeth and Hazel. At one point Hazel restates a line she heard her preacher say: "Had God meant for whites and blacks to mix, he'd have made them the same color." Now, although this could be left at the stance that it was just an opinion held by two (or many) people, it made me think about its context in a larger framework. What he is really saying is that the only people allowed to associate with one another are those that came out of the womb the same skin color. Although I am tempted to debate the religious part of the preacher's quote, I will refrain so that a point can be made about our cultural competency as future therapists.

There is one positive notion to the idea of gathering, celebrating, and appreciating the people of our own skin color- we develop a sense of identity within our respective cultures. "Because you are also Hispanic I can make inside jokes and praise or complain about Mexican food, family, value systems, etc." Within this exchange we get the comforting sense of "You make me feel known and I will make you feel known."

But.... what about the unknown?

If whites only minded their white business and blacks only minded their black business then each would remain culturally incompetent. They would never learn the whys or hows that make up the other's world in order to fully understand differences in culture, language, history, class, and other aspects. Thankfully, strict cultural boundaries have been breaking down (although, not fully of course). Nowadays it is common to see advertisements that have people of a variety of cultures where everyone is portrayed as equal. This is a direct entry into our practice as therapists. Not only are we to view the client's culture as different but equal, but we as human beings within a therapeutic relationship are different but equal.







Sure, water and oil don't mix and dissolve into one substance, but each drop clings to and travels around the other substance. This is the world today: boundaries among different types of entities all traveling around each other. I can never be any other culture, but that doesn't mean that I can't connect with non- Hispanics respectfully and empathetically.

-Erika